Notes: Scoring decision costs Halladay

Controversial hit adds five earned runs to ace's Saturday line

ARLINGTON -- There's no denying Roy Halladay sustained a mammoth beating in Saturday's 11-4 rout by the Rangers. But did the Jays ace suffer more than necessary, statistically speaking?

Halladay was charged with nine earned runs, matching the second-worst start of his career. But a dodgy scoring decision during the Rangers' six-run third inning had much to do with that.

With two on and one out in the third, the Rangers' Michael Young drove a sharp one-hopper just past third baseman Troy Glaus for what was ruled a two-run double. The ball skipped near Glaus' feet, but his backhanded attempt to stop it was unsuccessful.

"I didn't get a glove on it," Glaus said. "But that's definitely a play I should make."

At the request of Jays' team officials, the official scorer reviewed video of the play between innings. But he stuck with his ruling of a hit, meaning six earned runs were charged to Halladay in the inning instead of one. The scoring decision made the difference in Halladay's ERA climbing from 2.28 to 3.59, instead of to 2.73.

Halladay had no complaints, but Glaus said he shoulders partial responsibility for the big inning.

"I know that's not the way Doc is [worrying about his statistics]," Glaus said. "But in my opinion, that was an error all the way."

It also didn't help Halladay that reliever Josh Towers gave up a two-run double to the first batter he faced, Texas' Mark Teixeira, with one out in the sixth.

That hit allowed two inherited runners to score earned runs charged to Halladay. Had Towers put out the fire, Halladay's ERA would be 3.25 with the scoring decision of a hit, 2.39 if Glaus had been charged with an error.

Offense cooling: The Jays entered Sunday batting .268 as a team (tied for third among the 14 American League teams) and averaging 4.97 runs per game. But in losing the first five games of their road trip, they were hitting just .225 and scoring four runs per game.

"Part of it is the pitching you face," Jays manager John Gibbons said. "But I think, overall, our offense has put us in position to win a lot of games. We haven't always done it, but we've had some guys missing at times. That makes it easy to say, 'The offense isn't clicking.' But when you really analyze it, it's not been that bad."

Before Sunday, the Jays had both scored and allowed 149 runs through 30 games. Among the 30 big-league teams, only the Yankees, Mets and Marlins had scored more runs. But Toronto went into Sunday's series finale with the Rangers having been outscored on the five-game trip by more than a 2-1 margin (43-20).

Slump-busting BoSox? Toronto had another five-game losing streak earlier this season, but snapped it by winning two in a row against American League East-leading Boston. The first-place Red Sox are on deck for the Jays again, visiting Rogers Centre for a three-game series starting Tuesday.

"It's nice to have to face Boston every time you're trying to get yourself out of a streak," Gibbons said wryly.

Briefly: Right-hander Jesse Litsch, a 24th-round pick in the 2004 First-Year Player Draft, improved to 4-1 for Double-A New Hampshire when he gave up just one run in eight innings in Saturday's 3-1 victory over Bowie. Litsch has a 1.17 ERA after five starts. ... The Jays have not won a season series against Texas since 2001. The teams play 10 times this year and Toronto was 2-4 against the Rangers entering Sunday's series finale. ... Halladay issued a fourth-inning walk to the Rangers' Kenny Lofton on Saturday, the first unintentional walk he's given up in 24 1/3 innings.

Up next: The Blue Jays are off on Monday. Right-hander Victor Zambrano (0-1, 5.63 ERA) will oppose Boston's unbeaten righty Josh Beckett (6-0, 2.72) in Tuesday's opener of a three-game series with the Red Sox at 7:07 p.m. ET at Rogers Centre.

Ken Daley is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.